15+ gym tips to maximize performance and gains

Going to gym and spending hours there, and not getting any results is a real motivation breaker. But, there are few changes you can make, that can improve your performance in the gym and it will also help you gain more in a short interval of time.

You follow all the tips given below and you’ll definitely start seeing some results.

Gym tip #1 – Drink water between workout

It is very important to stay hydrated during workout, especially if you tend to sweat a lot. There are many people who think it is not good to drink water while exercising. Actually, until and unless you are drinking too much, I don’t think it should be a problem. And, before Gatorade and other sugary drinks, water was used to keep one energized. Here, is a little thing you can do, mix a little sugar in the water you take to gym and take a sip after one or two reps. Or take a few candies with you, a little flow of simple sugar can help you to do those extra reps and sets.

Gym tip #2 – Drink coffee before workout

It has been found that drinking coffee before working out can be very helpful to boost your metabolism. On top of that, coffee helps in improving the blood circulation, which will in turn, increase the amount of oxygen received by your muscles. And, more oxygen means more endurance and better performance. Coffee, as you know, helps you in waking up and it is a good idea to hit gym in all your senses. Most of people don’t get the importance of staying focused while you workout.

Gym tip #3 – Don’t be smart and isolate muscles

When you join gym, there is a strong temptation to keep on training your arms, especially biceps, until it becomes big as hell. But, is it the best way to go about it? No. First of all, when you train the same muscle group all the time, these muscles will never get the time to recover properly. This is not at all good for muscle development.

Secondly, breaking muscle fibres from different muscle group tells your body to produce more testosterone. I am not saying to stop doing isolated exercises but make sure to include at least one compound exercise in every session. Deadlift, benchpress, pull ups, squats are some examples of compound exercises.

Gym tip #4 – Try to go gym when hot girls around

This gym tip is only for men, as you can see. And, I don’t mean it in a pervert sort of way. I have a scientific proof backing this claim. A study done on a bunch of stake boarders showed that when around hot girls, these people took a lot more risks. When their testosterone level was tested, it showed around 10% rise.

Forget about the study, you might have noticed this by yourself, when a beautiful girl is working out beside you, you did more reps or picked higher weights.

Gym tip #5 – Wear proper clothes

Have you ever wonder why people make a special office in there houses, in spite of the fact that they can do their work at any part of the house. The reason is that, if you want to do some work, then your environment should be complimentary to the work you do. You can’t write a jingle for a perfume sitting at a very smelly place.

Similarly, wearing proper gym clothes will give you a psychological boost. It tells you body and brain that you are here for a reason, this helps you perform better in the gym. Secondly, gym clothes are designed for both comfort and movement, most of the regular clothes can’t fill their place.

For example, clothes like a compression t-shirt, helps in boosting your performance by the way it is designed.

Gym tip #6 – Decide beforehand – MUSCLE or STRENGTH

Most of the people who go to the gym are clueless about their goals. And, workout without a goal is similar to pushing the wall. You might feel tired and exhausted but you won’t get any results.

Now, people who go to gym need to have one of these 3 goals in their mind: 1) Muscle building 2) Endurance 3)Strength. And, believe me, the training for all of these is different. Like, a marathon runner will train for endurance rather than muscle mass. A body builder will train for muscle mass rather than strength.

People who lift heavy weight don’t usually have the best body around, but they have lots of strength. The mistake people make is that they mix up all these trainings and the resultant they get is nothing.

Example:

A person for higher endurance will do higher reps on less weight.

A person for muscle building(Hypertrophy) will do medium reps on medium weight.

A person for strength will do low reps on high weight.

Gym tip #7 – Eat fats

The moment you start going to gym, many so called experts will advice you to stay away from fats. Which is stupid and I’ll tell you how. Your brain is made up of fat, the lining of each and every cell is made up of fat, made hormones including testosterone is made up of fat. Now, if you don’t have enough fat, can you expect your body to function properly.

Testosterone, which is a growth hormone, is necessary to build muscle and lose belly fat, and if you fat is a building block of testosterone. Having testosterone in adequate amount can prove miraculous when it comes to performance and gains.

But, you have to make sure that the fat is coming from a natural source. Like, egg yolk is one of the best source for fats and against the popular belief it doesn’t clog up your arteries.

Gym tip #8 – Rest but not waste time

It is okay to rest…especially after finishing few set…think about what exercise you need to do next…picture yourself doing it…it is a very nice trick to give directions to your brain. Many runners do the same thing. They picturize running the entire race track before beginning the race.

Secondly, you can spend this rest time breathing deep. This will send enough oxygen to each exhausted muscle and prepare them for the next round. By resting between the sets you can go for a longer time but make sure you don’t rest too much. Doing one set and resting for 5-10 minutes is not going to help with your goals. It will waste your time.

Another mistake that people make is that they either talk to someone in the gym or they start texting in their resting time. When you do either of the two things you can neither focus on visualizing yourself nor on breathing deep.

Gym tip #9 – Seeing results will give you an amazing boost

Let us say, you are trying to lose weight. You are working your ass out every day and after 2-3 week you see no results at all. This is the biggest motivation killer that a person can get. Same goes for the person who is trying to build muscles. Seeing changes, although even small ones, is very important for many people to go on. Most of the people stop going to gym because even after spending so much time in the gym, they see absolutely no results.

Now, how can you see results quickly. I call it “cheat your way to success”. For example, the reason for you to look fat, apart from actual fat is water retention. So, if you manage to control salt intake and drink lots of water, it will cut down the water weight tremendously.

Gym tip #10 – Eat both simple and complex carbs

What to eat before workout? It is the most common question that gym goers have in their mind. There is no fixed answer to this question, different people do different things that work for them. You have to try different things and see what works best for you. Many people believe eating nothing before workout forces your body to burn stored fat to provide the energy. There are others who believe that eating nothing will not only ruin your performance, but it will also send your body to an energy conversation state, where it will burn the least amount of fat. Try everything for sometime and choose what gives you the result.

Or, you can try a combination of simple and complex carbs. Simple carbs are digested easily, so it provides glucose for instant energy and complex carbs will keep on provide a little constant energy throughout the workout. You can eat slices of bread with jam.

Gym tip #11 – Wear warm clothes

It is very important to warm up before a workout and equally important to maintain that temperature. A warm body can is not very prone to injuries and on top of that it also maximize the performance. In most of the gym you have air-conditioner, which is a good thing. But, it also plays a part in decreasing the body temperature, which is not good at all. Wearing warm clothes will trap the body heat, so that you’ll can rest for a little longer without worrying about cooling down.

Gym tip #12 – Eat your carbs properly for performance

There was a time when every where you go people told you to eat carbs as much as you can for maximum gains. And, now people will be telling you to stay away from the carbs. They were wrong then and they were wrong now. You need carbs for your daily activities and to fill up the glycogen reserves of your muscles. When you are under training, you tend to deplete the glycogen reserve very soon.

So, if you don’t eat carbs in proper quantity, your muscles won’t have enough energy currency(glycogen) to perform at its best. Some people gets smart with this. They start eating too much protein to compensate for decreased carbs in their diet. Look, body can synthesis a limited quantity of protein at any time. So, the extra protein is either flushed through urine or it will be used as energy. When protein is used as energy, then you don’t need carbs that much, which leads to its storage in the form of fat.

Gym tip #13 -Music can improve performance

There might be some songs that start pumping blood in your veins. Like, entrance music of some WWE superstar or the “The Chariots of fire” theme song by Vangalis or “Eye of the tiger” by Survivor. Listening to such songs can make an enormous difference in your workout. Obviously, when you go to a gym, you can’t decide which songs will be played, so it might happen that the songs are not very adrenal rushing for you.

Take i-pod or your phone and choose what you hear in the gym. Take song time to choose and download music that can really get you going. But, the thing is, after listening to these songs for some time, their effect will mitigate. The trick here is, that you must change the songs from time to time. Like after every one month. Believe me, this will create a huge difference in your gym sessions.

Gym tip #14 -Run for atleast 10 minutes before every workout

I know many trainers won’t agree with me on this one, as exhausting yourself pre-workout is not a good thing and can effect your performance in the gym. But, to that I would say, the purpose of a person should not be to hit the gym to suddenly build muscles. Our aim should be to build muscle and stamina simultaneously. Frankly, without good stamina you can have a basic physique and nothing more than that.

Secondly, running before a workout open up your lungs, which is very good if a weight training session follows.

Running everyday will:

Improve the lungs capacity

Decrease the body fat rapidly

Help you to warm up properly

Gym tip #15 – Connect your mind to your muscle

I see many people go to gym and start doing exercises they know very little about. In fact, even the gym trainers don’t care to discuss thoroughly about the exercises. Each exercise if designed to target a specific muscle or a set of muscles and until and unless you are not aware of those muscles, you can never to an exercise correctly. Going with the motion is the most common mistake and the biggest reason why many people don’t have good physique.

You should connect your mind with the muscle while you exercise. You must feel the tension in the muscle you are targeting. But, thanks to the internet, this kind of information is readily available on the internet. And, if you are very serious about muscle building, then I would suggest you must also study a little about the anatomy of various muscles.

Gym tip #16 – Find a gym partner

In case you have a trainer, it is good. But, if you don’t have a trainer you must really try to find out a gym partner. You can’t even imagine how beneficial it can be for your gym performance. When you have a partner, he/she will encourage you to do those last few reps, those last back breaking reps benefits you more than a million initial reps. And, secondly with a constant spotter you can push your limits.

The most important having a gym partner is the “competition.” Admit it or not, even if your gym partner is your best friend or your brother, there is always an on-going cold war. A battle to prove who is the strongest, who can lift more, who have more endurance. This competition is very necessary if you are serious about body building.

Gym tip #17 – Use smith machine

If you are a beginner than this machine should be your best friend. It is very hard for beginner to go straight away and start bench pressing. Or, doing barbell squats. Most of the beginners are scared of embarrassing themselves. That is where smith machine comes in. So, now you can bench press without the risk of being overwhelmed by the weight of barbell. Plus, you can test your limits to on the smith machine. Smith machine is very versatile and you can train pretty much every body part on it.